A podcast all about Japanese cartoons and comics as discussed by three self-proclaimed experts in the world of anime and manga! Plus anime news / reviews, coverage of classic anime, hentai / yaoi, and much, much more. Updated every week. We hope.

I guess I can at least put some timecode stuff up soon. We’ve really been failing at the “additional information links” as of late, though. Still, we can’t possibly be becoming dumb, as this online quiz we found on Livejournal CLEARLY demonstrates:

Somehow we get the feeling that EVERYONE gets told that only 2% of the people who took the test are less stupid than they are, to make themselves feel better about themselves. Note to self: AWO Myspace/Livejournal/Facebook is probably a bad idea because of things like this.

Introduction (0:00 – 28:08)
In the emails, we get firsthand confirmation on Overfiend’s negative effects on anime fandom in the UK (BEHOLD! The Ultimate Anime Collection!), as well as firsthand confirmation that Princess Ai does, in fact, suck. Also, we clarify some finer points regarding Giant Robo and exactly what the difference between “shonen ai” and “yaoi” is. Because yes, there is a difference.

Let’s News! (28:08 – 36:39)
The DVD for Arcadia of My Youth is going out of print, Hiroyuki Hoshiyama is dead, and in celebration of their tenth anniversary, Tokyopop is revising their manga ratings system. How exactly is it going to help parents by saying that a comic contains “fanservice”? Like they’d really know what that term means. Also, Steven Foster truly doesn’t understand why the Internet is so mad at him.

Promo: Weekly Anime Review Podcast (36:39 – 37:12)
Aaron’s been missing in action for the last few well, months, but he is back in business! The show may be undergoing alterations to its name and release schedule, but with any luck he’ll still be around, fighting the good fight.

Review (manga): The Kurosagi Corpse Delivery Service, Volume 1 (37:12 – 59:04)
Daryl reviews yet another tricky-to-find Dark Horse manga that is basically “BIZARRO~! Genshiken.” You will be happy to know that a few weeks after this recording, Daryl did manage to locate Volume 2 of this. He has not, however, taken any steps to become an actuary.

Review: Loveless (59:04 – 1:20:36)
Nekomimi…Nekomimi Mode! Nekomimi…oh wait, different show. Clarissa hasn’t done a shojo review in a while, and something had to be done to rid herself of the Austin Powers-level chest hair she developed as a result of watching MAZINKAISER~! last week. Loveless is the answer. It is not to be confused with the Vertigo comicbook by Brian Azzarello that takes place in the Old West and has all kinds of people totally getting shot and killed. We can only wonder how many people there are out there who go into the comicbook shop asking for one and ending up with the other.

Review: Dirty Pair: Project E.D.E.N. (1:20:36 – 1:45:50)
The following details were considered TOO INTENSE for the broadcast, but readers of the show notes may know of it: this anime contains a space butler samurai with a laser sword. Spoilers, schmoilers: this movie is celebrating its 20 year anniversary. Suffice it to say that this anime is still awesome to the max. You know what else we forgot to mention? The reason that opening credits sequence is so rad is because it was done by KOJI FUCKIN’ MORIMOTO:

Closing (1:45:50 – 1:48:19)
Next time, in an attempt to delay releasing something named Show # 50 by just that much more, we decide to take it easy and do an episode where we do nothing but answer voicemails. You know how we keep telling people to call or use the Odeo MP3 link, but we don’t seem to actually PLAY them that much? Yeah, that’s our bad. We’re going to try and fix that, but first things first: we gotta clear out what we got.

Actually, you’re almost right. Song of the Wind and the Trees *is* shonen-ai, in the actual original Japanese sense, and is generally the only one that most people over here are familiar with. The reason that they moved to other terms like BL is precisely because the trend of shoujo manga like the stuff Moto Hagio and Takemiya Keiko were doing, like all trends, eventually faded out.

Zetsuai could potentially be considered the first Boys Love title, though I believe it’s technically shoujo. It was the first in the movement after shonen ai burnt out, where publishers started recruiting new talent from yaoi doujinshi (Minami Ozaki used to do doujinshi for Captain Tsubasa IIRC, which can be seen in the soccer player character she used for Zetsuai) in order to create original m/m for girls stories that would sell to the newer audience.

There are some folks, like myself included, who enjoy both the old school shonen ai works and the newer BL manga. However, the majority of the audience has little to no overlap; the old shoujo readers who read shonen ai aren’t interested in BL and the BL fans don’t much enjoy the fairly uniformly tragic and largely sexless stories that made up shonen ai, preferring more explicitly romantic portrayals and happy endings. Honestly, while I appreciate the tragic works, I’m happy that unlike yuri, we managed to start getting a greater majority of works, and far earlier, where the gay characters didn’t necessarily have to descend into misery and then die.

You might also want to check out the Tanbi movement stuff, though a lot of that is pretty sexually explicit, so maybe not. I mention it because the whole point of Tanbi, aka Aestheticism, was to be as Pretentiously Literary as possible. Also, it’s rather sketchy because the only example of it that I can think of as being accessible is the animated version of Ai no Kusabi, which loses some detail of the manga, and also is fairly explicit, though only maybe softcore since there’s no genitalia shown. I like AnK a lot, it’s a scifi story and is as much about class issues and repression as it is about the forbidden lovers aspect.

Also, I think it’s a bit unfair to compare the hand-selected cream of the shonen-ai crop that most people over here have been treated to, seperated from shoujo completely, to the greater amount of BL we’re getting now.

BL stories are romances, as are tons of shoujo. If you take shonen-ai as part of shoujo (which it was), and take into account that we’ve only seen a small number of works by the pinnacle shoujo artists of the 49ers, then compare, it’s not all that different. Most romance stories, just like most giant robot stories or most comedy stories or whatnot, are made to be light entertainment, not incredibly deep ruminations on life or Grand Art. That goes regardless of whether the couples are male/female, male/male or female/female. So yeah, much of BL is fairly much like Harlequin romances, but so are most romances period (that includes shonen and seinen ones too).

Heh, I kind of agree. Thankfully, most of BL doesn’t seem to take itself all that seriously, which I think is a very good thing. Oy.

The fucked up relationships thing is touchy. There are times when I like it a lot, but then again sometimes it’s just badly done or the fans take it too seriously. It also depends on how it’s done. I know I can’t really get into Okane ga Nai at all, despite the fact that it’s hugely popular.

It’s kind of like how I feel about Weiss Kreuz. I watch that show because it’s so completely ridiculous that I find it entertaining. How people think it’s really moving and deep and stuff is beyond me, and I can’t talk to those people for very long without laughing at them.

Out of curiosity, are you into Motoni Modoru’s stuff at all? I think she’s one of the few BL artists who’s a really good writer and can write screwed up stories and characters movingly and intelligently. I’m thinking about doing a review for something of hers on the show, but I can’t decide what. Sadly, the only thing of hers that I think has been licensed over here is Poison Cherry Drive, which while entertaining, is not much like her other titles.

Well just to add anecdote about censorship in Amerika. The 1961 hit Wooly Bully (originally called Hully Gully) was band from radio broadcast when it first came out. It was banded because the people in charge didn’t understand the lyrics. Also in regards to the question of whether or not some one was really persecuted under obscenity laws in the U.K. it should be a mater of public record. So you should be able to check with what ever passes for government over there.

It’s dawned on me that I myself do not own a copy of the old Streamline dub of Akira. Someone with that tape ought to capture the audio and post it to assure that “I’m in charge now. Men, we’re going to the Olympics!” is preserved for all time. Super bonus points if it can somehow be synced up with the DVD video, since I still prefer Cam Clarke’s “so you’re the KING of the MOUNTAIN, Tetsuo, but it’s all GARBAGE!” Kaneda to Johnny Yong Bosch’s stylings, despite the latter’s Mecha nomination for Best Actor in a Comedy.

Maybe I should considering I’ve had this on my shelf for years and years that you’ve been over and apparently not noticed. 😛

But yes, McGruff the Crime Dog, Donatello, and Porky Pig all in one show! Yes, that was totally a dub of the ages.

Would you put it up as a torrent file?I have truble with MVK’s. I can’t seam to fined a good program that will convert them to a format that is conducive to being burned to DVD format and, yes i do own a copy of the 2 disc limited edition of AKIRA. If some one can suggest a good free converter and burner software it would be highly appreciated. In return I would be willing to burn some thing for you, granted it is not in region 1 and it’s not new.That sounds like a dub that would be worth seeing. Was that dub ever used on Saterday anime on sci fi. In fact was AKIRA on Saturday anime. I cant remember granted a was all of…..Well i cant remember DAM YOU MAKO!!!! O well there is a lot of stuff from the 90’s I can’t remember any more and i gues that is for the best.

I have truble with MVK’s. I can’t seam to fined a good program that will convert them to a format that is conducive to being burned to DVD format and, yes i do own a copy of the 2 disc limited edition of AKIRA.

If some one can suggest a good free converter and burner software it would be highly appreciated. In return I would be willing to burn some thing for you, granted it is not in region 1 and it’s not new.

I pretty much have all I need to do my files, though I don’t know of any free unless you don’t mind illegit keygen-cracked versions off BT. You pretty much have to pay to get the good tools to use. In making AVI’s, I usually don’t think much about wanting to upconvert them back to DVD’s at all, as I often just leave them as AVI’s since I have a few regular DVD players that can playback MPEG-4 files anyway.

That sounds like a dub that would be worth seeing. Was that dub ever used on Saterday anime on sci fi. In fact was AKIRA on Saturday anime. I cant remember granted a was all of…..Well i cant remember DAM YOU MAKO!!!! O well there is a lot of stuff from the 90’s I can’t remember any more and i gues that is for the best.

I remember SciFi used to show it outside that block in it’s own presentation. It usually lasted a tad over two hours the way they aired it with ad breaks, and usually at the end they would fill the time with some filler (used to remember back when SciFi used to show short films that way). Can’t remember any edits that might’ve been done to the film (unlike the way they had edited other anime titles for the Saturday Anime block due to content or timing constraints, the Galaxy Express 999 movies used to get tunicated badly due to their lengths to fit the 2-hour format).

Thank you for the info. Do you know Any other way i could get my hands on that dub? I have checked the normal places and they only have the new dub witch i am not a huge fan of. I guess my biggest problem is with MVK’s for some reasion my burner software does not recognize them when i go to bur a DVD.Thanks a gen for the info I love the discussions after the pod cast they are so informative!

General Beefy said… Thank you for the info. Do you know Any other way i could get my hands on that dub? I have checked the normal places and they only have the new dub witch i am not a huge fan of.

Me neither. I’ve been doing the same too (usually there seems to be a lot of us asking for the same thing elsewhere). I might have to go and buy an old VHS/LD copy with the dub and extract that.

I guess my biggest problem is with MVK’s for some reasion my burner software does not recognize them when i go to bur a DVD.

There’s always buying a new one (they’re not that expensive). I did so last week just so I could get it to burn again, as my previous burner starting copping out on me, especially on dual-layer discs I’ve noticed (also had to get a new rom playback drive as well).

I just burn MKV’s via Nero Burning Rom anyway, not sure what software you commonly use, but I haven’t had a problem with multiple file formats on mine.

I assume if you were trying to do a regular “DVD-Video” of an MKV (or just a regular AVI file itself, you need to extract the AVI and/or audio tracks out through this program…http://www.videohelp.com/tools?tool=609

I’ve used this already and found it to be quite good.

Thanks a gen for the info I love the discussions after the pod cast they are so informative!

We have friends who went out and bought that shitty, stupid DBZ box set–they should be ashamed of themselves!

I am, Gerald, I am. In my defense, it was partially because I couldn’t quite comprehend that FUNimation would do something so fucking stupid (I didn’t realize that it’s already been done to shows like Cheers and Star Trek-TOS. There’s even a term for it: “Tilt & Scan”), partially because I thought maybe I could get the full picture if I set my DVD player to “Pan & Scan” (BATSU!), and partially because I thought that, since there were a lot of movies I enjoyed despite them being Pan & Scan, maybe I’d enjoy these episodes despite the different style of cropping. I tried watching the first episode and quickly realized that this was not the case. I never realized how well-composed anime frames were until I saw them altered, and the fact that FUNimation doesn’t understand this makes me sad that despite a regiment of George Carlin concerts I still don’t have enought epithets to throw at them.

Have you seen their comparison? Don’tcha love how they picked a frame with very little on the top and bottom, used a ridiculous amount of overscan in their 4:3 TV example, then used a 16:9 widescreen example with no overscan?

On their forums they claim “We sat down with the guys who do this for a living to get their take on many of the comments and questions being raised.” In a word: huh? They never say if they ended up following the advice of these “guys,” and they repeat about how you’re actually seeing more because of the overscan of an older tv (and claiming that all the overscan on a widescreen TV is a black image).

[Takes several deep breaths]

Anyhow, I prepared a presentation on different aspect ratios and cropped images, and I’ll use it tomorrow when I try to get Wal-Mart to take back the opened DBZ box. I know they usually don’t take returns on opened DVD’s, but maybe if I raise enough of a fuss they’ll make an exception.

E. Bernhard Warg mentioned: I am, Gerald, I am. In my defense, it was partially because I couldn’t quite comprehend that FUNimation would do something so fucking stupid (I didn’t realize that it’s already been done to shows like Cheers and Star Trek-TOS. There’s even a term for it: “Tilt & Scan”), partially because I thought maybe I could get the full picture if I set my DVD player to “Pan & Scan” (BATSU!), and partially because I thought that, since there were a lot of movies I enjoyed despite them being Pan & Scan, maybe I’d enjoy these episodes despite the different style of cropping.

Heh, surprised “Tilt & Scan” hasn’t been became a buzz word to refer to modifying works filmed purposely in full-frame (TV shows, pre-50’s movies, etc.). Though for a true Tile & Scan to be done, the image would have to move up or down or be distorted horizontally in order to maintain certain things like opening credits or if something happen to be a tad out-of-frame in case it was possible to get that.

I tried watching the first episode and quickly realized that this was not the case. I never realized how well-composed anime frames were until I saw them altered, and the fact that FUNimation doesn’t understand this makes me sad that despite a regiment of George Carlin concerts I still don’t have enought epithets to throw at them.

All they needed to do was the movies and be done with it (since the movies were already made to be shown in the wider format anyway)!

Have you seen their comparison? Don’tcha love how they picked a frame with very little on the top and bottom, used a ridiculous amount of overscan in their 4:3 TV example, then used a 16:9 widescreen example with no overscan?

Shame really. Can’t they show an anamorphic image without the black bars, or are we still in that stone-age mentality of not even owning HD sets yet?

Anyhow, I prepared a presentation on different aspect ratios and cropped images, and I’ll use it tomorrow when I try to get Wal-Mart to take back the opened DBZ box. I know they usually don’t take returns on opened DVD’s, but maybe if I raise enough of a fuss they’ll make an exception.

Wish me luck.

Well hopefully the visual aids will help clue ’em in, if not, at least I’ll forgive you anyway! I would’ve done the same thing too, except for the fact I would’ve bought it more for the hell of seeing the show again without any real interest in being an obsessive nut about it, but perhaps I’ll just download the episodes anyway!

By the way, I found the Streamline Akira dub, though it was from a PAL source at 25fps, and had to slow it down for 23.976 NTSC othewrise but it works.

I know they usually don’t take returns on opened DVD’s, but maybe if I raise enough of a fuss they’ll make an exception.

Keep us updated on your efforts. I wish more people I knew would take those sets back and call them “damaged” goods or something, but too many people we know just look at the episode count, price and go “Oh God, it’s so cheap, I have to get it!”

Ah well, some could say that we’re beating this horse to death, but I think that if people will continue to be stupid and buy that set, then we don’t really have a choice.

It worked! I had no trouble at all. I just explained to the clerk why I wanted to return it and showed her the diagrams I had prepared, and she refunded the money back to my MasterCard with no problems.

Mind you, it might have helped that it was Wal-Mart–I despise them in many ways, but their habit of bending the rules to please their customers may well be what allowed this to happen.

Anyway, if anyone is interested, I’ll make a PDF or something of my diagram sheet and post it online.

Heh, surprised “Tilt & Scan” hasn’t been became a buzz word to refer to modifying works filmed purposely in full-frame (TV shows, pre-50’s movies, etc.). Though for a true Tile & Scan to be done, the image would have to move up or down or be distorted horizontally in order to maintain certain things like opening credits or if something happen to be a tad out-of-frame in case it was possible to get that.

Well, “Pan & Scan” was used even if there was no panning (or at least it *was*, before some TAKAKURA came up with the misleading term “Fullscreen”), so there’s no reason why “Tilt & Scan” shouldn’t be used despite the lack of tilting.